Jilted City by Patrick McGuinness

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Synopsis

From short lyric pieces to long poetic sequences, moving elegies to playful translations, this collection explores how a sense of place and displacement are often unexpectedly connected. The poems, written both formally and in free verse, move from old and new Europe to the open spaces of North America and the urban frenzy of its cities, traveling in dreamlike journeys and vivid treks around the world. With versions of great European poets—such as Rilke, Baudelaire, and Rimbaud—and the first English translation of the Romanian dissident Liviu Campanu, this highly accomplished offering is about places and nonspaces—and whatever lies in between.

Patrick McGuinness was born in Tunisia in 1968 and lived in Bucharest in the years leading up to the Romanian revolution. He is a professor of French and comparative literature at Oxford University and a fellow of St. Anne's College. As a poet, he has won an Eric Gregory Award and Poetry magazine's Levinson Prize. His latest collection, Jilted City, was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. McGuinness lives between Oxford and North West Wales. His web site is www.patrickmcguinness.org.uk.